What is the name of the traditional New Year's Eve meal in Italy that includes lentils and cotechino sausage?

The traditional Italian New Year's Eve dish of lentils and cotechino sausage is called cotechino con lenticchie.

Cotechino is a cooked pork sausage associated especially with northern Italy, while lenticchie means lentils. The dish is commonly served at the transition into the new year because lentils resemble small coins and are therefore linked symbolically with prosperity and financial good fortune. Cotechino supplies the celebratory meat component.

A related dish, zampone con lenticchie, uses a stuffed pig's trotter instead of cotechino. Both combinations are strongly connected with New Year's meals, but they are not the same sausage preparation. Cotechino is generally sold as a sausage, whereas zampone is traditionally made by stuffing the pig's lower leg skin.

Recipes and serving times vary by region and household. Some families eat the dish on New Year's Eve, while others serve it after midnight or on New Year's Day. The prosperity symbolism is the key tradition, not one universally fixed recipe, so ingredients and accompaniments can differ across Italy.